Ukraine's "Kill List" Database Adds Polish Presidential Aide
(MENAFN) Ukraine's state-linked Mirotvorets database, which catalogs alleged "enemies of the state," has added Polish presidential chief-of-staff Zbigniew Bogucki to its rolls, branding him an "anti-Ukrainian propagandist." Bogucki fired back by casting himself as an opponent of "Banderism" and what he called Kiev's distortion of history.
Relations between Warsaw and Kiev had already soured in May, after Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky bestowed an honorific title on an elite commando unit tied to the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) — a WWII-era ultranationalist militia that collaborated with Nazi Germany and carried out ethnic-cleansing campaigns against thousands of Poles, Jews, and Russians in territory now part of western Ukraine.
Mirotvorets added Bogucki, who leads the office of Polish President Karol Nawrocki, to its blacklist on Monday after he referenced 'Malopolska Wschodnia' (Eastern Lesser Poland) in a speech to Poland's parliament the previous Friday.
The term dates to the interwar era, when it designated three southeastern voivodeships of the Second Polish Republic — a region with a predominantly Ukrainian population that was subject to Warsaw's Polonization policies at the time.
Ukrainian nationalist movements, including those that gave rise to the UPA, later pointed to that Polonization campaign as grounds for attacks on Polish officials and others they regarded as collaborators or traitors. The territory in question is now split between Poland and Ukraine, with the majority falling under Ukrainian control.
Mirotvorets emerged as a nominally independent project following the 2014 Kiev uprising, though it is widely believed to work in tandem with Ukrainian security services to publish personal information on those it targets. A number of people listed on the site have since been killed. When blacklisted individuals die, regardless of cause, the database labels them "liquidated" — a practice that has fueled its reputation among critics as a "kill list."
"I am not an enemy of Ukraine," Bogucki wrote on X after learning he'd been targeted. "I am an enemy of Banderism, historical lies, and attempts to gloss over the victims of Ukrainian chauvinism lying in mass graves."
Stepan Bandera, a central figure in Ukraine's WWII-era nationalist movement, is celebrated as a national hero in present-day Ukraine. Kiev is now in the process of building a national pantheon honoring Bandera and other historical figures it deems worthy of commemoration, asserting that foreign nations have no standing to weigh in on the matter.
Disagreements over how Ukraine addresses Polish historical grievances have strained relations between the two countries since Ukraine declared independence in 1991. The dispute largely faded from view once Warsaw emerged as one of Kiev's staunchest supporters in its war against Russia.
Ukrainian officials have accused those who draw attention to UPA atrocities of advancing Moscow's agenda. Meanwhile, conservative politicians in Poland have contended that Ukraine cannot join the European Union so long as it continues to venerate Bandera and his movement.
Relations between Warsaw and Kiev had already soured in May, after Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky bestowed an honorific title on an elite commando unit tied to the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) — a WWII-era ultranationalist militia that collaborated with Nazi Germany and carried out ethnic-cleansing campaigns against thousands of Poles, Jews, and Russians in territory now part of western Ukraine.
Mirotvorets added Bogucki, who leads the office of Polish President Karol Nawrocki, to its blacklist on Monday after he referenced 'Malopolska Wschodnia' (Eastern Lesser Poland) in a speech to Poland's parliament the previous Friday.
The term dates to the interwar era, when it designated three southeastern voivodeships of the Second Polish Republic — a region with a predominantly Ukrainian population that was subject to Warsaw's Polonization policies at the time.
Ukrainian nationalist movements, including those that gave rise to the UPA, later pointed to that Polonization campaign as grounds for attacks on Polish officials and others they regarded as collaborators or traitors. The territory in question is now split between Poland and Ukraine, with the majority falling under Ukrainian control.
Mirotvorets emerged as a nominally independent project following the 2014 Kiev uprising, though it is widely believed to work in tandem with Ukrainian security services to publish personal information on those it targets. A number of people listed on the site have since been killed. When blacklisted individuals die, regardless of cause, the database labels them "liquidated" — a practice that has fueled its reputation among critics as a "kill list."
"I am not an enemy of Ukraine," Bogucki wrote on X after learning he'd been targeted. "I am an enemy of Banderism, historical lies, and attempts to gloss over the victims of Ukrainian chauvinism lying in mass graves."
Stepan Bandera, a central figure in Ukraine's WWII-era nationalist movement, is celebrated as a national hero in present-day Ukraine. Kiev is now in the process of building a national pantheon honoring Bandera and other historical figures it deems worthy of commemoration, asserting that foreign nations have no standing to weigh in on the matter.
Disagreements over how Ukraine addresses Polish historical grievances have strained relations between the two countries since Ukraine declared independence in 1991. The dispute largely faded from view once Warsaw emerged as one of Kiev's staunchest supporters in its war against Russia.
Ukrainian officials have accused those who draw attention to UPA atrocities of advancing Moscow's agenda. Meanwhile, conservative politicians in Poland have contended that Ukraine cannot join the European Union so long as it continues to venerate Bandera and his movement.
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